Good Getaways 31 | Good Getaways

After the old hotel burned, rental cabins, many on the brow of Lookout Mountain, grew popular in Mentone. Cupid’s Past, above, is built of old heart pine logs. At an elevation of about 1,700 feet, the cabin offers expansive views of Big Wills Valley, more than 800 feet below. Good Getaways

Escape to Mentone

Story and photos by David Moore

Maybe sometimes you want to get away to Gatlinburg or Pigeon Forge and join the bustle of people pounding the seemingly endless strips of tourist attractions, souvenir shops and pancake restaurants.

Then sometimes you want to go to the mountains and truly escape from all the hassle and skip the five-hour drive.

Nestled on the brow of Lookout Mountain northeast of Fort Payne, Mentone is an hour and 11 minutes from Guntersville. Along with nearby DeSoto State Park, Little River Canyon and their waterfalls, it makes for a scenic and quiet destination – though it was not always quiet.

Founded in the late 1880s as a tourist town, Mentone’s namesake is a small port on the French Riviera. It supposedly means “musical mountain spring,” which may be local

Visiting Mentone? Be sure to check out Wildflower Cafe, voted “Best Cafe in Alabama.” Owner Laura Catherine Moon and crew can prepare you a great Canyon Burger, above, as well as more fanciful dishes, such as tomato pie and black ‘n’ blue prime rib. Mentone Market is a great place to pick up a burger or pizza, too. Mentone has long been an art colony, and no artist has been showing her work there longer than Sharon Burke, who lives in Arab but still runs the delightfully eclectic Gourdie Shop, photo submitted. The Mentone Arts Center is also a testament to the creative population. Mentone Springs Hotel had its 19th century glamour meticulously restored in 2010-11 – third photo from the left, courtesy of Mentone’s Groundhog newspaper – and residents still mourn its demise by an electrical fire March 1, 2014. But the rugged, natural beauty of Lookout Mountain, DeSoto Falls and Little River Falls at the head of the canyon, right, continue to draw people to this scenic corner of Alabama.

lore, as is the claim that Hernando DeSoto explored the area in 1540 (he entered Alabama near Piedmont and headed south on the Coosa River).

Musical or not, mineral springs were Mentone’s first attraction. Capitalizing on that was the grand dame Mentone Springs Hotel. Built in the 1880s, it drew thousands of tourists to the area’s supposedly healing waters. Tragically, the hotel and its neighboring White Elephant Galleries burned to the ground in 2014. Thus, in an infrastructural sense, Mentone is a shell of its former self.

But the entrepreneurial spirit that built the big, fashionable hotel and the artistic soul that spawned the galleries are both vibrant today.

And the rugged, wooded beauty and vistas Lookout Mountain offers are still in full force. As a testament to this, many people today enjoy second homes here, more are under construction, and some are very reasonably priced rentals.

Over the years, Mentone was said to have attracted the highest density of summer camps in the country. Cloudmont Ski and Golf Resort is nearby, where you can ski on machine-made snow when overnight temps drop to 28 and colder.

Hiking trails abound at Little River Canyon National Preserve and DeSoto State Park – the latter which, like Cloudmont, also offers accommodations.

Mentone, simply put, makes for a fine getaway.

Good Life Magazine

TRAVEL TIP: There are several routes from Marshall County, but perhaps the prettiest is from the city of Guntersville; take Ala. 227 to Geraldine, then Ala. 75 north to Rainsville and Ala. 35 east to Fort Payne. Follow Galt Avenue northeast to Valley Head and Ala. 117 up the mountain to Mentone.